ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Thursday condemned Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip and called for its immediate lifting to help Palestinians effectively fight the coronavirus pandemic.
“Blockade of the Gaza Strip violates international law and is condemnable,” said the foreign office spokesperson, Aisha Farooqui, during her weekly media briefing in Islamabad. “Pakistan calls for the immediate lifting of the blockade in order for Palestine to fight against the coronavirus pandemic.”
Israel linked any medical assistance to the residents of the area to the recovery of its two soldiers who disappeared during the 2014 war in the Palestinian enclave.
Blockaded and impoverished, Gaza has reported 13 coronavirus cases and authorities worry that local health care facilities — with just 96 ventilators for a population of two million — are insufficient to deal with the contagion.
A Palestinian health ministry official said on Wednesday that the Gaza Strip had stopped testing people at its labs after coronavirus test kits completely ran out, indicating that a major catastrophe was waiting to happen if the infectious respiratory illness spread in the densely populated enclave.
“We reiterate our support for a viable, independent and contiguous State of Palestine, on the basis of internationally agreed parameters, the pre-1967 borders with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital,” said the Pakistani spokesperson.
The country’s former ambassador, Asif Durrani, who also served in the Middle East, termed the Israeli blockade of medical supplies to the Gaza Strip as an inhuman act.
“The Israeli action is totally inhuman and against all basic norms. When the whole world is fighting COVID-19, Israel has put millions of lives at stake. They have already conducted gross human rights violations and now this will increase the suffering of Palestine people,” Durrani told Arab News, adding that the United Nations and influential international countries should exert pressure on Israel to ensure proper supply of medical equipment required to deal with the pandemic in the Palestinian territories.
Pakistan calls for immediate lifting of Gaza blockade amid coronavirus outbreak
https://arab.news/z4xh9
Pakistan calls for immediate lifting of Gaza blockade amid coronavirus outbreak
- The foreign office demands an immediate end to Israeli siege to help people of Palestine fight COVID-19
- Analysts describe Israeli action as inhuman, call for swift action from world powers
Pakistan PM orders accelerated privatization of power sector to tackle losses
- Tenders to be issued for privatization of three major electricity distribution firms, PMO says
- Sharif says Pakistan to develop battery energy storage through public-private partnerships
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s prime minister on Monday directed the government to speed up privatization of state-owned power companies and improve electricity infrastructure nationwide, as authorities try to address deep-rooted losses and inefficiencies in the energy sector that have weighed on the economy and public finances.
Pakistan’s electricity system has long struggled with financial distress caused by a combination of factors including theft of power, inefficient collection of bills, high costs of generating electricity and a large burden of unpaid obligations known as “circular debt.” In the first quarter of the current financial year, government-owned distribution companies recorded losses of about Rs171 billion ($611 million) due to poor bill recovery and operational inefficiencies, official documents show. Circular debt in the broader power sector stood at around Rs1.66 trillion ($5.9 billion) in mid-2025, a sharp decline from past peaks but still a major fiscal drain.
Efforts to contain these losses have been a focus of Pakistan’s economic reform program with the International Monetary Fund, which has urged structural changes in the energy sector as part of financing conditions. Previous government initiatives have included signing a $4.5 billion financing facility with local banks to ease power sector debt and reducing retail electricity tariffs to support economic recovery.
“Electricity sector privatization and market-based competition is the sustainable solution to the country’s energy problems,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said at a meeting reviewing the roadmap for power sector reforms, according to a statement from the prime minister’s office.
The meeting reviewed progress on privatization and infrastructure projects. Officials said tenders for modernizing one of Pakistan’s oldest operational hubs, Rohri Railway Station, will be issued soon and that the Ghazi Barotha to Faisalabad transmission line, designed to improve long-distance transmission of electricity, is in the initial approval stages. While not all power-sector decisions were detailed publicly, the government emphasized expanding private sector participation and completing priority projects to strengthen the electricity grid.
In another key development, the prime minister endorsed plans to begin work on a battery energy storage system with participation from private investors to help manage fluctuations in supply and demand, particularly as renewable energy sources such as solar and wind take a growing role in generation. Officials said the concept clearance for the storage system has been approved and feasibility studies are underway.
Government briefing documents also outlined steps toward shifting some electricity plants from imported coal to locally mined Thar coal, where a railway line expansion is underway to support transport of fuel, potentially lowering costs and import dependence in the long term.
State authorities also pledged to address safety by converting unmanned railway crossings to staffed ones and to strengthen food safety inspections at stations, underscoring broader infrastructure and service improvements connected to energy and transport priorities.
